Are there really concrete contractors out there that pour footings without a proper construction survey? I wouldn't be caught dead doing that, nor would I be caught dead not having my construction survey sub stake everything out first if the contract spelled out it was my responsibility. And this unfortunate situation is exactly why we do it this way. It only costs me a couple hundred bucks to have it properly staked - by a licensed professional surveyor. He's never screwed up, and I sleep soundly knowing the liability is covered. Plus he's independent and has no stake in this other than doing it absolutely correctly. A concrete contractor may be inclined to rush or skip a step. Or just be plain inexperienced.

My advice to everyone that reads this thread in the future is this: when GC'ing your own job, have someone in your network that knows what they're doing and can give you advice start to finish, so these kind of mistakes can be avoided.

For the OP, I don't envy you. I would talk to the bank and tell them what happened and tell them you need to get a lawyer involved. It would suck out loud if someone slapped a lien on your property to force you into some sort of negotiation, and a lawyer would help you the most right now.

And if there was a paid GC on this job, it would ultimately be his responsibility to sort out. He'd fighting this battle with his subs right now, not you.

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Are there really concrete contractors out there that pour footings without a proper construction survey? I wouldn't be caught dead doing that, nor would I be caught dead not having my construction survey sub stake everything out first if the contract spelled out it was my responsibility. And this unfortunate situation is exactly why we do it this way. It only costs me a couple hundred bucks to have it properly staked - by a licensed professional surveyor. He's never screwed up, and I sleep soundly knowing the liability is covered. Plus he's independent and has no stake in this other than doing it absolutely correctly. A concrete contractor may be inclined to rush or skip a step. Or just be plain inexperienced.

Aggie, we actually set 95% of our own corners in residetial additions. Never have these problems. The very few times the surveying was done by a sub, they were wrong. They all had a tenancy to take their starting points off of the wrong elemnet of the existing structure. The one that stays strong in my mind was a 1800 sq. ft. addition footprint at some odd angle (like 23.45 degrees or something) to the existing 1860's house. They had taken a starting point off of the house over 3+ layers of siding, not the rim joist or foundation. I called & explained the discrepancies to the firm, they told me there wasn't much they could do, it was layed out right according to there transit & software.

On new residential, we almost always have 2 or 3 corners staked for us to reference. I always check set backs off of property lines myself if I know there is little margin. Our work often times gets re-certified before backill, never failed one in 11 years yet. I wish the same could be said for our surveyors lay-outs. If I could trust their marks, we could save a vast amount of time.

There's no excuse that a mason or concrete contractor can't square a residential addition themselves. If they cant handle the math, or are too lazy to double or triple check, they should go back to working fo an employer again.

The concrete conctractor took the blame and eate the cost cause he said he set the pins.

All of this is on a construction loan from a bank. The Concrete contractor said he would buy all materials for the masonry contractor to redo the garage foundation and the masonry contractor said he is doing his labor for free, and the concrete wants to excavate the garage his self. I don't want that I want the excavator who has down the entire job to do it again because his work was done excellent and he has underground insurance. The concrete contractor and the masonry contractor does not want to pay for the excavator. And lastly both the concrete contractor and the masonry contractor said they will not layout the work or setup the pins for square if I make them redo everyhing and that will be on me to layout the work and the square.
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I'm not a lawyer, but it seems that between the two contractors, they've agreed to remedy the situation. You need to have someone square up and locate the starter pins and they will build it to spec. Sounds like neither of these guys was charged with squaring up the job. Around here if the contractor agrees to fix his screw up at no expense to you, then you don't have a legal case. It sounds like the only hang up is with the excavating. If I were one of the contractors, I would want to use my own equipment to minimize my out of pocket expense to correct the problem as well. I'd say let them rebuild it. You provide the locations. You've already agreed to the "fix" on the other mistake, so no biscuit there either. Let them finish, pay the bill and chalk it up to lessons learned.

i'm w/you, jo,,, have laid out many runways, aprons, slabs, & roads & found errors,,, that doesn't mean we didn't use licens'd surveyors - we just had to ck EVERYONE's work,,, while arch, engineers, & owners occasionally make errors, many times it falls to the contractor to find & report 'em,,, knowing something's wrong & NOT doing so makes US liable for damages,,, change orders & rfi's are VERY common.

I am a GC in Wilkes Barre, Pa and I am firm about this responsibility. The footing were put in wrong and the person that put them in is liable for doing it right but the masonry contractor is even more wrong... The footing should have been poured 24" and the mason would have been able to lay it out square., but the cheap prick wanted to save concrete cost....... Hence you need to join both parties in a lawsuit about this. I lay the blame mostly on the mason because he should have never laid a block after he laid out his block and realized it was out of square.... I have never in all my days EVER heard of a mason not laying out his walls... It makes no sense... I sincerely hope you have specific language in the mason contract that list out the actual size of the addition, not just lay block for addition... if this verbage is not present, I feel the his legal responsibility becomes more cloudy....
I hope you have it repaired at no cost to you.....